Thunderbird 3 out this month

Open source email system makeover.

The Mozilla Foundation has announced that the latest version of its Thunderbird email system will be out this month.

The release candidate version of Thunderbird 3 will be out next week and the company expects the final version to be released by mid-November, although it hasn't set a firm launch date in line with Mozilla's long-standing policy of releasing software when it's ready and not before.

Mozilla is claiming that 2,000 individual improvements have been made to the Thunderbird.

Chief among these are a new search tool that uses an SQL backend but a Mozilla-developed algorithm to enable users to search across multiple email accounts and then filter research by the date the email was sent or received, by whom it received for or directed too and by keywords.

Other improvements include a host of new skins for the platform, tabbed email to allow for multiple displays simultaneously and improved archiving.

Mozilla is also expecting a boost in takeup from the recent launch of Windows 7.

“The fact that Windows 7 was launched with no native email client is very encouraging,” Mozilla's director of marketing told V3.co.uk.

“It'll give a lot of users more of a chance to try out Thunderbird and see for themselves.”

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